Scottish sketches

CHAPTER IV.

At length one morning David Cameron came into the bank, and having finished his business, walked up to James and said, "I feared ye were ill, James. Whatna for hae ye stayed awa sae lang? I wanted ye sairly last night to go o'er wi' me the points in this debate at our kirk. We are to hae anither session to-night; ye'll come the morn and talk it o'er wi' me?"

"I will, Mr. Cameron."

But James instantly determined to see Christine that night. Her father would be at the kirk session, and if Donald was there, he thought he knew how to whisper him away. He meant to have Christine all to himself for an hour or two, and if he saw any opportunity he would tell her all. When he got to David's the store was still open, but the clerk said, "David has just gone," and James, as was his wont, walked straight to the parlor.

Donald was there; he had guessed that, because a carriage was in waiting, and he knew it could belong to no other caller at David Cameron's. And never had Donald roused in him such an intense antagonism. He was going to some National Celebration, and he stood beside Christine in all the splendid picturesque pomp of the McFarlane tartans. He was holding Christine's hand, and she stood as a white lily in the glow and color of his dark beauty. Perhaps both of them felt James' entrance inopportune. At any rate they received him coldly, Donald drew Christine a little apart, said a few whispered words to her, and lifting his bonnet slightly to James, he went away.

In the few minutes of this unfortunate meeting the devil entered into James' heart. Even Christine was struck with the new look on his face. It was haughty, malicious, and triumphant, and he leaned against the high oaken chimney-piece in a defiant way that annoyed Christine, though she could not analyze it.

"Sit down, James," she said with a touch of authority—for his attitude had unconsciously put her on the defensive. "Donald has gone to the Caledonian club; there is to be a grand gathering of Highland gentlemen there to-night."

"Gentlemen!"

"Well, yes, gentlemen! And there will be none there more worthy the name than our Donald."

"The rest of them are much to be scorned at, then."

"James, James, that speech was little like you. Sit down and come to yourself; I am sure you are not so mean as to grudge Donald the rights of his good birth."

"Donald McFarlane shall have all the rights he has worked for; and when he gets his just payment he will be in Glasgow jail."

"James, you are ill. You have not been here for a week, and you look so unlike yourself. I know you must be ill. Will you let me send for our doctor?" And she approached him kindly, and looked with anxious scrutiny into his face.

He put her gently away, and said in a thick, rapid voice,

"Christine, I came to-night to tell you that Donald McFarlane is unworthy to come into your presence—he has forged your father's name."

"James, you are mad, or ill, what you say is just impossible!"

"I am neither mad nor ill. I will prove it, if you wish."

At these words every trace of sympathy or feeling vanished from her face; and she said in a low, hoarse whisper,

"You cannot prove it. I would not believe such a thing possible."

Then with a pitiless particularity he went over all the events relating to the note, and held it out for her to examine the signature.

"Is that David Cameron's writing?" he cried; "did you ever see such a weak imitation? The man is a fool as well as a villain."

Christine gazed blankly at the witness of her cousin's guilt, and James, carried away with the wicked impetuosity of his passionate accusations of Donald's life, did not see the fair face set in white despair and the eyes close wearily, as with a piteous cry she fell prostrate at his feet.

Ah, how short was his triumph! When he saw the ruin that his words had made he shrieked aloud in his terror and agony. Help was at hand, and doctors were quickly brought, but she had received a shock from which it seemed impossible to revive her. David was brought home, and knelt in speechless distress by the side of his insensible child, but no hope lightened the long, terrible night, and when the reaction came in the morning, it came in the form of fever and delirium.

Questioned closely by David, James admitted nothing but that while talking to him about Donald McFarlane she had fallen at his feet, and Donald could only say that he had that evening told her he was going to Edinburgh in two weeks, to study law with his cousin, and that he had asked her to be his wife.

This acknowledgement bound David and Donald in a closer communion of sorrow. James and his sufferings were scarcely noticed. Yet, probably of all that unhappy company, he suffered the most. He loved Christine with a far deeper affection than Donald had ever dreamed of. He would have given his life for hers, and yet he had, perhaps, been her murderer. How he hated Donald in those days! What love and remorse tortured him! And what availed it that he had bought the power to ruin the man he hated? He was afraid to use it. If Christine lived, and he did use it, she would never forgive him; if she died, he would be her murderer.

But the business of life cannot be delayed for its sorrows. David must wait in his shop, and James must be at the bank; and in two weeks Donald had to leave for Edinburgh, though Christine was lying in a silent, broken-hearted apathy, so close to the very shoal of Time that none dared say, "She will live another day."

How James despised Donald for leaving her at all; he desired nothing beyond the permission to sit by her side, and watch and aid the slow struggle of life back from the shores and shades of death.

It was almost the end of summer before she was able to resume her place in the household, but long before that she had asked to see James. The interview took place one Sabbath afternoon while David was at church. Christine had been lifted to a couch, but she was unable to move, and even speech was exhausting and difficult to her. James knelt down by her side, and, weeping bitterly, said,

"O Christine, forgive me!"

She smiled faintly.

"You—have—not—used—yonder—paper,—James?"

"Oh, no, no."

"It—would—kill—me. You—would—not—kill—me?"

"I would die to make you strong again."

"Don't—hurt—Donald. Forgive—for—Christ's—sake,—James!"

Poor James! It was hard for him to see that still Donald was her first thought, and, looking on the wreck of Christine's youth and beauty, it was still harder not to hate him worse than ever.

Nor did the temptation to do so grow less with time. He had to listen every evening to David's praises of his nephew: how "he had been entered wi' Advocate Scott, and was going to be a grand lawyer," or how he had been to some great man's house and won all hearts with his handsome face and witty tongue. Or, perhaps, he would be shown some rich token of his love that had come for Christine; or David would say, "There's the 'Edinbro' News,' James; it cam fra Donald this morn; tak it hame wi' you. You're welcome." And James feared not to take it, feared to show the slightest dislike to Donald, lest David's anger at it should provoke him to say what was in his heart, and Christine only be the sufferer.

One cold night in early winter, James, as was his wont now, went to spend the evening in talking with David and in watching Christine. That was really all it was; for, though she had resumed her house duties, she took little part in conversation. She had always been inclined to silence, but now a faint smile and a "Yes" or "No" were her usual response, even to her father's remarks. This night he found David out, and he hesitated whether to trouble Christine or not. He stood for a moment in the open door and looked at her. She was sitting by the table with a little Testament open in her hand; but she was rather musing on what she had been reading than continuing her occupation.

"Christine!"

"James!"

"May I come in?"

"Yes, surely."

"I hear your father has gone to a town-meeting."

"Yes."

"And he is to be made a bailie."

"Yes."

"I am very glad. It will greatly please him, and there is no citizen more worthy of the honor."

"I think so also."

"Shall I disturb you if I wait to see him?"

"No, James; sit down."

Then Christine laid aside her book and took her sewing, and James sat thinking how he could best introduce the subject ever near his heart. He felt that there was much to say in his own behalf, if he only knew how to begin. Christine opened the subject for him. She laid down her work and went and stood before the fire at his side. The faintest shadow of color was in her face, and her eyes were unspeakably sad and anxious. He could not bear their eager, searching gaze, and dropped his own.

"James, have you destroyed yonder paper?"

"Nay, Christine; I am too poor a man to throw away so much hard-won gold. I am keeping it until I can see Mr. McFarlane and quietly collect my own."

"You will never use it in any way against him?"

"Will you ever marry him? Tell me that."

"O sir!" she cried indignantly, "you want to make a bargain with my poor heart. Hear, then. If Donald wants me to marry him I'll never cast him off. Do you think God will cast him off for one fault? You dare not say it."

"I do not say but what God will pardon. But we are human beings; we are not near to God yet."

"But we ought to be trying to get near him; and oh, James, you never had so grand a chance. See the pitiful face of Christ looking down on you from the cross. If that face should turn away from you, James—if it should!"

"You ask a hard thing of me, Christine."

"Yes, I do."

"But if you will only try and love me—"

"Stop, James! I will make no bargain in a matter of right and wrong. If for Christ's sake, who has forgiven you so much, you can forgive Donald, for Christ's dear sake do it. If not, I will set no earthly love before it. Do your worst. God can find out a way. I'll trust him."

"Christine! dear Christine!"

"Hush! I am Donald's promised wife. May God speak to you for me. I am very sad and weary. Good-night."

James did not wait for David's return. He went back to his own lodging, and, taking the note out of his pocket-book, spread it before him. His first thought was that he had wared #89 on his enemy's fine clothes, and James loved gold and hated foppish, extravagant dress; his next that he had saved Andrew Starkie #89, and he knew the old usurer was quietly laughing at his folly. But worse than all was the alternative he saw as the result of his sinful purchase: if he used it to gratify his personal hatred, he deeply wounded, perhaps killed, his dearest love and his oldest friend. Hour after hour he sat with the note before him. His good angel stood at his side and wooed him to mercy. There was a fire burning in the grate, and twice he held the paper over it, and twice turned away from his better self.

The watchman was calling "half-past two o'clock," when, cold and weary with his mental struggle, he rose and went to his desk. There was a secret hiding-place behind a drawer there, in which he kept papers relating to his transactions with Andrew Starkie, and he put it among them. "I'll leave it to its chance," he muttered; "a fire might come and burn it up some day. If it is God's will to save Donald, he could so order it, and I am fully insured against pecuniary loss." He did not at that moment see how presumptuously he was throwing his own responsibility on God; he did not indeed want to see anything but some plausible way of avoiding a road too steep for a heart weighed down with earthly passion to dare.

Then weeks and months drifted away in the calm regular routine of David's life. But though there were no outward changes, there was a very important inward one. About sixteen months after Donald's departure he returned to visit Christine. James, at Christine's urgent request, absented himself during this visit; but when he next called at David's, he perceived at once that all was not as had been anticipated. David had little to say about him; Christine looked paler and sadder than ever. Neither quite understood why. There had been no visible break with Donald, but both father and daughter felt that he had drifted far away from them and their humble, pious life. Donald had lost the child's heart he had brought with him from the mountains; he was ambitious of honors, and eager after worldly pleasures and advantages. He had become more gravely handsome, and he talked more sensibly to David; but David liked him less.

After this visit there sprang up a new hope in James' heart, and he waited and watched, though often with very angry feelings; for he was sure that Donald was gradually deserting Christine.

She grew daily more sad and silent; it was evident she was suffering. The little Testament lay now always with her work, and he noticed that she frequently laid aside her sewing and read it earnestly, even while David and he were quietly talking at the fireside.

One Sabbath, two years after Donald's departure, James met David coming out of church alone. He could only say, "I hope Christine is well."

"Had she been well, she had been wi' me; thou kens that, James."

"I might have done so. Christine is never absent from God's house when it is open."

"It is a good plan, James; for when they who go regular to God's house are forced to stay away, God himself asks after them. I hae no doubt but what Christine has been visited."

They walked on in silence until David's house was in sight. "I'm no caring for any company earth can gie me the night, James; but the morn I hae something to tell you I canna speak anent to-day."

CHAPTER V.

The next day David came into the bank about noon, and said, "Come wi' me to McLellan's, James, and hae a mutton pie, it's near by lunch-time." While they were eating it David said, "Donald McFarlane is to be wedded next month. He's making a grand marriage."

James bit his lip, but said nothing.

"He's spoken for Miss Margaret Napier; her father was ane o' the Lords o' Session; she's his sole heiress, and that will mean #50,000, foreby the bonnie place and lands o' Ellenshawe."

"And Christine?"

"Dinna look that way, man. Christine is content; she kens weel enough she isna like her cousin."

"God be thanked she is not. Go away from me, David Cameron, or I shall say words that will make more suffering than you can dream off. Go away, man."

David was shocked and grieved at his companion's passion. "James," he said solemnly, "dinna mak a fool o' yoursel'. I hae long seen your ill-will at Donald. Let it go. Donald's aboon your thumb now, and the anger o' a poor man aye falls on himsel'."

"For God's sake don't tempt me farther. You little know what I could do if I had the ill heart to do it."

"Ow! ay!" said David scornfully, "if the poor cat had only wings it would extirpate the race of sparrows from the world; but when the wings arena there, James lad, it is just as weel to mak no boast o' them."

James had leaned his head in his hands, and was whispering, "Christine! Christine! Christine!" in a rapid inaudible voice. He took no notice of David's remark, and David was instantly sorry for it. "The puir lad is just sorrowful wi' love for Christine, and that's nae sin that I can see," he thought. "James," he said kindly, "I am sorry enough to grieve you. Come as soon as you can like to do it. You'll be welcome."

James slightly nodded his head, but did not move; and David left him alone in the little boarded room where they had eaten. In a few minutes he collected himself, and, like one dazed, walked back to his place in the bank. Never had its hours seemed so long, never had the noise and traffic, the tramping of feet, and the banging of doors seemed so intolerable. As early as possible he was at David's, and David, with that fine instinct that a kind heart teaches, said as he entered, "Gude evening, James. Gae awa ben and keep Christine company. I'm that busy that I'll no shut up for half an hour yet."

James found Christine in her usual place. The hearth had been freshly swept, the fire blazed brightly, and she sat before it with her white seam in her hand. She raised her eyes at James' entrance, and smilingly nodded to a vacant chair near her. He took it silently. Christine seemed annoyed at his silence in a little while, and asked, "Why don't you speak, James? Have you nothing to say?"

"A great deal, Christine. What now do you think of Donald McFarlane?"

"I think well of Donald."

"And of his marriage also?"

"Certainly I do. When he was here I saw how unfit I was to be his wife. I told him so, and bid him seek a mate more suitable to his position and prospects."

"Do you think it right to let yonder lady wed such a man with her eyes shut?"

"Are you going to open them?" Her face was sad and mournful, and she laid her hand gently on James' shoulder.

"I think it is my duty, Christine."

"Think again, James. Be sure it is your duty before you go on such an errand. See if you dare kneel down and ask God to bless you in this duty."

"Christine, you treat me very hardly. You know how I love you, and you use your power over me unmercifully."

"No, no, James, I only want you to keep yourself out of the power of Satan. If indeed I have any share in your heart, do not wrong me by giving Satan a place there also. Let me at least respect you, James."

Christine had never spoken in this way before to him; the majesty and purity of her character lifted him insensibly to higher thoughts, her gentleness soothed and comforted him. When David came in he found them talking in a calm, cheerful tone, and the evening that followed was one of the pleasantest he could remember. Yet James understood that Christine trusted in his forbearance, and he had no heart to grieve her, especially as she did her best to reward him by striving to make his visits to her father unusually happy.

So Donald married Miss Napier, and the newspapers were full of the bridegroom's beauty and talents, and the bride's high lineage and great possessions. After this Donald and Donald's affairs seemed to very little trouble David's humble household. His marriage put him far away from Christine's thoughts, for her delicate conscience would have regarded it as a great sin to remember with any feeling of love another woman's affianced husband; and when the struggle became one between right and wrong, it was ended for Christine. David seldom named him, and so Donald McFarlane gradually passed out of the lives he had so sorely troubled.

Slowly but surely James continued to prosper; he rose to be cashier in the bank, and he won a calm but certain place in Christine's regard. She had never quite recovered the shock of her long illness; she was still very frail, and easily exhausted by the least fatigue or excitement. But in James' eyes she was perfect; he was always at his best in her presence, and he was a very proud and happy man when, after eight years' patient waiting and wooing, he won from her the promise to be his wife; for he knew that with Christine the promise meant all that it ought to mean.

The marriage made few changes in her peaceful life. James left the bank, put his savings in David's business, and became his partner. But they continued to live in the same house, and year after year passed away in that happy calm which leaves no records, and has no fate days for the future to date from.

Sometimes a letter, a newspaper, or some public event, would bring back the memory of the gay, handsome lad that had once made so bright the little back parlor. Such strays from Donald's present life were always pleasant ones. In ten years he had made great strides forward. Every one had a good word for him. His legal skill was quoted as authority, his charities were munificent, his name unblemished by a single mean deed.

Had James forgotten? No, indeed. Donald's success only deepened his hatred of him. Even the silence he was compelled to keep on the subject intensified the feeling. Once after his marriage he attempted to discuss the subject with Christine, but the scene had been so painful he had never attempted it again; and David was swift and positive to dismiss any unfavorable allusion to Donald. Once, on reading that "Advocate McFarlane had joined the Free Kirk of Scotland on open confession of faith," James flung down the paper and said pointedly, "I wonder whether he confessed his wrong-doing before his faith or not."

"There's nane sae weel shod, James, that they mayna slip," answered David, with a stern face. "He has united wi' Dr. Buchan's kirk—there's nane taken into that fellowship unworthily, as far as man can judge."

"He would be a wise minister that got at all Advocate McFarlane's sins, I am thinking."

"Dinna say all ye think, James. They walk too fair for earth that naebody can find fault wi'."

So James nursed the evil passion in his own heart; indeed, he had nursed it so long that he could not of himself resign it, and in all his prayers—and he did pray frequently, and often sincerely—he never named this subject to God, never once asked for his counsel or help in the matter.

Twelve years after his marriage with Christine David died, died as he had often wished to die, very suddenly. He was well at noon; at night he had put on the garments of eternal Sabbath. He had but a few moments of consciousness in which to bid farewell to his children. "Christine," he said cheerfully, "we'll no be lang parted, dear lassie;" and to James a few words on his affairs, and then almost with his last breath, "James, heed what I say: 'Blessed are the merciful, for they shall—obtain mercy.'"

There seemed to have been some prophetic sense in David's parting words to his daughter, for soon after his death she began to fail rapidly. What James suffered as he saw it only those can tell who have watched their beloved slowly dying, and hoped against hope day after day and week after week. Perhaps the hardest part was the knowledge that she had never recovered the health she had previous to the terrible shock which his revelation of Donald's guilt had been to her. He forgot his own share in the shock and threw the whole blame of her early decay on Donald. "And if she dies," he kept saying in his angry heart, "I will make him suffer for it."

And Christine was drawing very near to death, though even when she was confined to her room and bed James would not believe it. And it was at this time that Donald came once more to Glasgow. There was a very exciting general election for a new Parliament, and Donald stood for the Conservative party in the city of Glasgow. Nothing could have so speedily ripened James' evil purpose. Should a forger represent his native city? Should he see the murderer of his Christine win honor upon honor, when he had but to speak and place him among thieves?

During the struggle he worked frantically to defeat him—and failed. That night he came home like a man possessed by some malicious, ungovernable spirit of hell. He would not go to Christine's room, for he was afraid she would discover his purpose in his face, and win him from it. For now he had sworn to himself that he would only wait until the congratulatory dinner. He could get an invitation to it. All the bailies and the great men of the city would be there. The newspaper reporters would be there. His triumph would be complete. Donald would doubtless make a great speech, and after it he would say his few words.

Then he thought of Christine. But she did not move him now, for she was never likely to hear of it. She was confined to her bed; she read nothing but her Bible; she saw no one but her nurse. He would charge the nurse, and he would keep all papers and letters from her. He thought of nothing now but the near gratification of a revengeful purpose for which he had waited twenty years. Oh, how sweet it seemed to him!

The dinner was to be in a week, and during the next few days he was like a man in a bad dream. He neglected his business, and wandered restlessly about the house, and looked so fierce and haggard that Christine began to notice, to watch, and to fear. She knew that Donald was in the city, and her heart told her that it was his presence only that could so alter her husband; and she poured it out in strong supplications for strength and wisdom to avert the calamity she felt approaching.

That night her nurse became sick and could not remain with her, and James, half reluctantly, took her place, for he feared Christine's influence now. She would ask him to read the Bible, to pray with her; she might talk to him of death and heaven; she might name Donald, and extract some promise from him. And he was determined now that nothing should move him. So he pretended great weariness, drew a large chair to her bedside, and said,

"I shall try and sleep a while, darling; if you need me you have only to speak."

CHAPTER VI.

He was more weary than he knew, and ere he was aware he fell asleep—a restless, wretched sleep, that made him glad when the half-oblivion was over. Christine, however, was apparently at rest, and he soon relapsed into the same dark, haunted state of unconsciousness. Suddenly he began to mutter and moan, and then to speak with a hoarse, whispered rapidity that had in it something frightful and unearthly. But Christine listened with wide-open eyes, and heard with sickening terror the whole wicked plot. It fell from his half-open lips over and over in every detail; and over and over he laughed low and terribly at the coming shame of the hated Donald.

She had not walked alone for weeks, nor indeed been out of her room for months, but she must go now; and she never doubted her strength. As if she had been a spirit, she slipped out of bed, walked rapidly and noiselessly into the long-unfamiliar parlor. A rushlight was burning, and the key of the old desk was always in it. Nothing valuable was kept there, and people unacquainted with the secret of the hidden drawer would have looked in vain for the entrance to it. Christine had known it for years, but her wifely honor had held it more sacred than locks or keys could have done. She was aware only that James kept some private matter of importance there, and she would as readily have robbed her husband's purse as have spied into things of which he did not speak to her.

Now, however, all mere thoughts of courtesy or honor must yield before the alternative in which James and Donald stood. She reached the desk, drew out the concealing drawer, pushed aside the slide, and touched the paper. There were other papers there, but something taught her at once the right one. To take it and close the desk was but the work of a moment, then back she flew as swiftly and noiselessly as a spirit with the condemning evidence tightly clasped in her hand.

James was still muttering and moaning in his troubled sleep, and with the consciousness of her success all her unnatural strength passed away. She could hardly secrete it in her bosom ere she fell into a semi-conscious lethargy, through which she heard with terror her husband's low, weird laughter and whispered curses.

At length the day for the dinner came. James had procured an invitation, and he made unusual personal preparations for it. He was conscious that he was going to do a very mean action, but he would look as well as possible in the act. He had even his apology for it ready; he would say that "as long as it was a private wrong he had borne the loss patiently for twenty years, but that the public welfare demanded honest men, men above reproach, and he could no longer feel it his duty," etc., etc.

After he was dressed he bid Christine "Good-by."

"He would only stay an hour," he said, "and he must needs go, as Donald was her kin."

Then he went to the desk, and with hands trembling in their eagerness sought the bill. It was not there. Impossible! He looked again—again more carefully—could not believe his eyes, and looked again and again. It was really gone. If the visible hand of God had struck him, he could not have felt it more consciously. He mechanically closed the desk and sat down like one stunned. Cain might have felt as James did when God asked him, "Where is thy brother?" He did not think of prayer. No "God be merciful to me a sinner" came as yet from his dry, white lips. The fountains of his heart seemed dry as dust. The anger of God weighed him down till

Meantime Christine was lying with folded hands, praying for him. She knew what an agony he was going through, and ceaselessly with pure supplications she prayed for his forgiveness. About midnight one came and told him his wife wanted to see him. He rose with a wretched sigh, and looked at the clock. He had sat there six hours. He had thought over everything, over and over—the certainty that the paper was there, the fact that no other paper had been touched, and that no human being but Christine knew of the secret place. These things shocked him beyond expression. It was to his mind a visible assertion of the divine prerogative; he had really heard God say to him, "Vengeance is mine." The lesson that in these materialistic days we would reason away, James humbly accepted. His religious feelings were, after all, his deepest feelings, and in those six hours he had so palpably felt the frown of his angry Heavenly Father that he had quite forgotten his poor, puny wrath at Donald McFarlane.

As he slowly walked up stairs to Christine he determined to make to her a full confession of the deed he had meditated. But when he reached her bedside he saw that she was nearly dead. She smiled faintly and said,

"Send all away, James. I must speak alone with you, dear; we are going to part, my husband."

Then he knelt down by her side and held her cold hands, and the gracious tears welled up in his hot eyes, and he covered them with the blessed rain.

"O James, how you have suffered—since six o'clock."

"You know then, Christine! I would weep tears of blood over my sin. O dear, dear wife, take no shameful memory of me into eternity with you."

"See how I trust you, James. Here is poor, weak Donald's note. I know now you will never use it against him. What if your six hours were lengthened out through life—through eternity? I ask no promise from you now, dear."

"But I give it. Before God I give it, with all my heart. My sin has found me out this night. How has God borne with me all these years? Oh, how great is his mercy!"

Then Christine told him how he had revealed his wicked plot, and how wonderful strength had been given her to defeat it; and the two souls, amid their parting sighs and tears, knew each other as they had never done through all their years of life.

For a week James remained in his own room. Then Christine was laid beside her father, and the shop was reopened, and the household returned to its ways. But James was not seen in house or shop, and the neighbors said,

"Kirsty Cameron has had a wearisome sickness, and nae doobt her gudeman was needing a rest. Dootless he has gane to the Hielands a bit."

But it was not northward James Blackie went. It was south; south past the bonnie Cumberland Hills and the great manufacturing towns of Lancashire and the rich valleys of Yorkshire; southward until he stopped at last in London. Even then, though he was weary and sick and the night had fallen, he did not rest. He took a carriage and drove at once to a fashionable mansion in Baker street. The servant looked curiously at him and felt half inclined to be insolent to such a visitor.

"Take that card to your master at once," he said in a voice whose authority could not be disputed, and the man went.

His master was lying on a sofa in a luxuriously-furnished room, playing with a lovely girl about four years old, and listening meanwhile to an enthusiastic account of a cricket match that two boys of about twelve and fourteen years were giving him. He was a strikingly handsome man, in the prime of life, with a thoroughly happy expression. He took James' card in a careless fashion, listened to the end of his sons' story, and then looked at it. Instantly his manner changed; he stood up, and said promptly,

"Go away now, Miss Margaret, and you also, Angus and David; I have an old friend to see." Then to the servant, "Bring the gentleman here at once."

When he heard James' step he went to meet him with open hand; but James said,

"Not just yet, Mr. McFarlane; hear what I have to say. Then if you offer your hand I will take it."

"Christine is dead?"

"Dead, dead."

They sat down opposite each other, and James did not spare himself. From his discovery of the note in old Starkie's possession until the death of Christine, he confessed everything. Donald sat with downcast eyes, quite silent. Once or twice his fierce Highland blood surged into his face, and his hand stole mechanically to the place where his dirk had once been, but the motion was as transitory as a thought. When James had finished he sat with compressed lips for a few moments, quite unable to control his speech; but at length he slowly said,

"I wish I had known all this before; it would have saved much sin and suffering. You said that my indifference at first angered you. I must correct this. I was not indifferent. No one can tell what suffering that one cowardly act cost me. But before the bill fell due I went frankly to Uncle David and confessed all my sin. What passed between us you may guess; but he forgave me freely and fully, as I trust God did also. Hence there was no cause for its memory to darken life."

"I always thought Christine had told her father," muttered James.

"Nay, but I told him myself. He said he would trace the note, and I have no doubt he knew it was in your keeping from the first."

Then James took it from his pocket-book.

"There it is, Mr. McFarlane. Christine gave it back to me the hour she died. I promised her to bring it to you and tell you all."

"Christine's soul was a white rose without a thorn. I count it an honor to have known and loved her. But the paper is yours, Mr. Blackie, unless I may pay for it."

"O man, man! what money could pay for it? I would not dare to sell it for the whole world! Take it, I pray you."

"I will not. Do as you wish with it, James, I can trust you."

Then James walked towards the table. There were wax lights burning on it, and he held it in the flame and watched it slowly consume away to ashes. The silence was so intense that they heard each other breathing, and the expression on James' face was so rapt and noble that even Donald's stately beauty was for the moment less attractive. Then he walked towards Donald and said,

"Now give me your hand, McFarlane, and I'll take it gladly."

And that was a handclasp that meant to both men what no words could have expressed.

"Farewell, McFarlane; our ways in this world lie far apart; but when we come to die it will comfort both of us to remember this meeting. God be with you!"

"And with you also, James. Farewell."

Then James went back to his store and his shadowed household life. And people said he looked happier than ever he had done, and pitied him for his sick wife, and supposed he felt it a happy release to be rid of her. So wrongly does the world, which knows nothing of our real life, judge us.

You may see his gravestone in Glasgow Necropolis to-day, and people will tell you that he was a great philanthropist, and gave away a noble fortune to the sick and the ignorant; and you will probably wonder to see only beneath his name the solemn text, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord."

FACING HIS ENEMY.

CHAPTER I.

Forty years ago there stood in the lower part of the city of Glasgow a large, plain building which was to hundreds of very intelligent Scotchmen almost sacred ground. It stood among warehouses and factories, and in a very unfashionable quarter; but for all that, it was Dr. William Morrison's kirk. And Dr. Morrison was in every respect a remarkable man—a Scotchman with the old Hebrew fervor and sublimity, who accepted the extremest tenets of his creed with a deep religious faith, and scorned to trim or moderate them in order to suit what he called "a sinfu' latitudinarian age."

Such a man readily found among the solid burghers of Glasgow a large "following" of a very serious kind, douce, dour men, whose strongly-marked features looked as if they had been chiselled out of their native granite—men who settled themselves with a grave kind of enjoyment to listen to a full hour's sermon, and who watched every point their minister made with a critical acumen that seemed more fitting to a synod of divines than a congregation of weavers and traders.

A prominent man in this remarkable church was Deacon John Callendar. He had been one of its first members, and it was everything to his heart that Jerusalem is to the Jew, or Mecca to the Mohammedan. He believed his minister to be the best and wisest of men, though he was by no means inclined to allow himself a lazy confidence in this security. It was the special duty of deacons to keep a strict watch over doctrinal points, and though he had never had occasion to dissent in thirty years' scrutiny, he still kept the watch.

In the temporal affairs of the church it had been different. There was no definite creed for guidance in these matters, and eight or ten men with strong, rugged wills about #, s., d., each thinking highly of his own discretion in monetary affairs, and rather indifferently of the minister's gifts in this direction, were not likely to have always harmonious sessions.

They had had a decidedly inharmonious one early in January of 184-, and Deacon Callendar had spoken his mind with his usual blunt directness. He had been a good deal nettled at the minister's attitude, for, instead of seconding his propositions, Dr. Morrison had sat with a faraway, indifferent look, as if the pending discussion was entirely out of his range of interest. John could have borne contradiction better. An argument would have gratified him. But to have the speech and statistics which he had so carefully prepared fall on the minister's ear without provoking any response was a great trial of his patience. He was inwardly very angry, though outwardly very calm; but Dr. Morrison knew well what a tumult was beneath the dour still face of the deacon as he rose from his chair, put on his plaid, and pulled his bonnet over his brows.

"John," he said kindly, "you are a wise man, and I aye thought so. It takes a Christian to lead passion by the bridle. A Turk is a placid gentleman, John, but he cannot do it."

"Ou, ay! doubtless! There is talk o' the Turk and the Pope, but it is my neighbors that trouble me the maist, minister. Good-night to ye all. If ye vote to-night you can e'en count my vote wi' Dr. Morrison's; it will be as sensible and warld-like as any o' the lave."

With this parting reflection he went out. It had begun to snow, and the still, white solitude made him ashamed of his temper. He looked up at the quiet heavens above him, then at the quiet street before him, and muttered with a spice of satisfaction, "Speaking comes by nature, and silence by understanding. I am thankfu' now I let Deacon Strang hae the last word. I'm saying naught against Strang; he may gie good counsel, but they'll be fools that tak it."

"Uncle!"

"Hout, Davie! Whatna for are you here?"

"It began to snow, and I thought you would be the better of your cloak and umbrella. You seem vexed, uncle."

"Vexed? Ay. The minister is the maist contrary o' mortals. He kens naething about church government, and he treats gude siller as if it wasna worth the counting; but he's a gude man, and a great man, Davie, and folk canna serve the altar and be money-changers too. I ought to keep that i' mind. It's Deacon Strang, and no the minister."

"Well, uncle, you must just thole it; you know what the New Testament says?"

"Ay, ay; I ken it says if a man be struck on one cheek, he must turn the other; but, Davie, let me tell you that the man who gets the first blow generally deserves the second. It is gude Christian law no to permit the first stroke. That is my interpretation o' the matter."

"I never thought of that."

"Young folk don't think o' everything."

There was something in the tone of this last remark which seemed to fit best into silence, and David Callendar had a particular reason for not further irritating his uncle. The two men without any other remark reached the large, handsome house in Blytheswood Square which was their home. Its warmth and comfort had an immediate effect on the deacon. He looked pleasantly at the blazing fire and the table on the hearthrug, with its basket of oaten cakes, its pitcher of cream, and its whiskey-bottle and toddy glasses. The little brass kettle was simmering before the fire, his slippers were invitingly warm, his loose coat lying over the back of his soft, ample chair, and just as he had put them on, and sank down with a sigh of content, a bright old lady entered with a spicy dish of kippered salmon.

"I thought I wad bring ye a bit relish wi' your toddy, deacon. Talking is hungry wark. I think a man might find easier pleasuring than going to a kirk session through a snowstorm."

"A man might, Jenny. They'd suit women-folk wonderfu'; there's plenty o' talk and little wark."

"Then I dinna see ony call to mak a change, deacon."

"Now, Jenny, you've had the last word, sae ye can go to bed wi' an easy mind. And, Jenny, woman, dinna let your quarrel wi' Maggie Launder come between you and honest sleep. I think that will settle her," he observed with a pawky smile, as his housekeeper shut the door with unnecessary haste.

Half an hour afterwards, David, mixing another glass of toddy, drew his chair closer to the fire, and said, "Uncle John, I want to speak to you."

"Speak on, laddie;" but David noticed that even with the permission, cautious curves settled round his uncle's eyes, and his face assumed that business-like immobility which defied his scrutiny.

"I have had a very serious talk with Robert Leslie; he is thinking of buying Alexander Hastie out."

"Why not think o' buying out Robert Napier, or Gavin Campbell, or Clydeside Woolen Works? A body might as weel think o' a thousand spindles as think o' fifty."

"But he means business. An aunt, who has lately died in Galloway, has left him #2,000."

"That isna capital enough to run Sandy Hastie's mill."

"He wants me to join him."

"And how will that help matters? Twa thousand pounds added to Davie Callendar will be just #2,000."

"I felt sure you would lend me #2,000; and in that case it would be a great chance for me. I am very anxious to be—"

"Your ain maister."

"Not that altogether, uncle, although you know well the Callendars come of a kind that do not like to serve. I want to have a chance to make money."

"How much of your salary have you saved?"

"I have never tried to save anything yet, uncle, but I am going to begin."

The old man sat silent for a few moments, and then said, "I wont do it, Davie."

"It is only #2,000, Uncle John."

"Only #2,000! Hear the lad! Did ye ever mak #2,000? Did ye ever save #2,000? When ye hae done that ye'll ne'er put in the adverb, Davie. Only #2,000, indeed!"

"I thought you loved me, uncle."

"I love no human creature better than you. Whatna for should I not love you? You are the only thing left to me o' the bonnie brave brother who wrapped his colors round him in the Afghan Pass, the brave-hearted lad who died fighting twenty to one. And you are whiles sae like him that I'm tempted—na, na, that is a' byganes. I will not let you hae the #2,000, that is the business in hand."

"What for?"

"If you will hear the truth, that second glass o' whiskey is reason plenty. I hae taken my ane glass every night for forty years, and I hae ne'er made the ane twa, except New Year's tide."

"That is fair nonsense, Uncle John. There are plenty of men whom you trust for more than #2,000 who can take four glasses for their nightcap always."

"That may be; I'm no denying it; but what is lawfu' in some men is sinfu' in others."

"I do not see that at all."

"Do you mind last summer, when we were up in Argyleshire, how your cousin, Roy Callendar, walked, with ne'er the wink o' an eyelash, on a mantel-shelf hanging over a three-hundred-feet precipice? Roy had the trained eyesight and the steady nerve which made it lawfu' for him; for you or me it had been suicide—naething less sinfu'. Three or four glasses o' whiskey are safer for some men than twa for you. I hae been feeling it my duty to tell you this for some time. Never look sae glum, Davie, or I'll be thinking it is my siller and no mysel' you were caring for the night when ye thought o' my cloak and umbrella."

The young man rose in a perfect blaze of passion.

"Sit down, sit down," said his uncle. "One would think you were your grandfather, Evan Callendar, and that some English red-coat had trod on your tartan. Hout! What's the use o' a temper like that to folk wha hae taken to the spindle instead o' the claymore?"

"I am a Callendar for all that."

"Sae am I, sae am I, and vera proud o' it fore-bye. We are a' kin, Davie; blood is thicker than water, and we wont quarrel."

David put down his unfinished glass of toddy. He could not trust himself to discuss the matter any farther, but as he left the room he paused, with the open door in his hand, and said,

"If you are afraid I am going to be a drunkard, why did you not care for the fear before it became a question of #2,000? And if I ever do become one, remember this, Uncle John—you mixed my first glass for me!"